Warriors doing the business
Wrapping up some of the weekend’s biggest stories - and some that aren’t that big
The All Blacks impressive performance in Mendoza had a match 12 hours earlier in West Sydney, where the Warriors were way too good for a depleted Parramatta team, dismantling them 46-10.
They did the business on the field, then confirmed some good business off the field by inking in hooker Wayde Egan (and young centre Ali Leiataua) to extensions through to the end of 2025.
Egan plays like a “typically Aussie battler” - and has a tendency to put his head into bad positions - but that description, as complimentary as it is, sells him short.
He’s a smart footballer who has fully bought into what the club is trying to achieve under Andrew Webster and has got better season on season. As seasoned observer Dai Henwood says: “The connection around the ruck between him, Tohu Harris, Shaun Johnson and to a lesser extent Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad is amazing. It has been understated the influence he is having on Freddy Lussick, who is starting to play a similarly solid game.”
The star of the show on Saturday night was five-eighth Luke Metcalf, who has endured the smoothest start to his Warriors career, but is now emerging as a vital part of the machinery.
“The best part about Luke’s game tonight was how reliable it was,” said Webster. “It wasn’t flashy - it looked flashy, because he’s brilliant. He’s fast and he moves well.
“It was within the way we wanted to play. Luke shines when he does that.”
One of the bonuses of Metcalf’s form as there is no pressure to rush back Te Maire Martin from his rehab on his broken leg. The Warriors suddenly have two bona fide first-grade five-eighths.
H/t to my father, who pointed out that we had the rare sight of two sons of All Blacks directly marking off against each other in an NRL match.
Rocco Berry is the son of Marty, All Black #878, while the Eels’ Bailey Simonsson, their best on a bad night, is the son of Paul, All Black #890.
Paul Simonsson was a prized recruit for the North Sydney Bears in 1990, but only played three games before wrecking his knee. His injury opened up a spot for another Waikato rugby recruit who was nowhere near as prized, but could kick a decent goal - Daryl ‘Chook’ Halligan.
There ends your little history lesson.
Meanwhile, the Warriors next two games, both at home, against teams around them on the table - the Sharks and the Raiders - shape as critical.
Still struggling to get my head around Sam Cane’s more-than-a-leg-trip yet less-than-a-shoeing of a pitch invader is dominating the All Black discourse.
Thankfully NZME’s Elliott Smith was on the ground to clear everything up.
“I have no real issue with what Sam Cane has done here. The pitch invaders were coming from left, right and centre from fulltime - I suspect there would have been 15 or so at least. One nearly took out Damian McKenzie and I as we were speaking for Sky,” Smith tweeted.
The reviews of Eddie Jones’ Big Australian Adventure PtII are in and they’re not kind.
Eddie Jones said he wanted a “robust performance” from his new-look Wallabies. He got an insipid debacle. He told media he had coached his men to play like “mongrel dogs”. He delivered a mob of mewling pussycats. He promised fans this week was the first step toward a “smash and grab” on rugby’s greatest prize. Instead, 62-days out from the World Cup, a season that promised so much has kicked off with disaster.
Hiring a coach like Jones to a long-term contract always shaped as a massive gamble for Rugby Australia, but writing him and the Wallabies off after one bad outing would be a mistake.
Couldn’t be happier that the series is still alive but remain convinced that the Ashes will stay in the south - even after this morning’s thriller fell on the side of the hosts.
Australia leads the series 2-1, which sounds about right, even though the score could be 3-0 either way had a few things happened differently. England had a chance to take Australia out of the first test and didn’t; likewise Australia at Headingley.
That’s the beauty of test cricket.
Having watched every ball of England’s successful chase, I can report that they were a little unlucky to be in a position to lose, then they were freakishly lucky to win.
Joe Root is such a critical factor for England, being one of the few players in that side with the genuine batting skills to be consistently successful against this attack. He gloved a nothing paddle pull to a nothing ball to be strangled down the leg side.
The other player with immense skills, though perhaps not of the consistent kind, is Ben Stokes, and he also feathered a leg glance to a nothing ball. That’s your two best players gone with 90 runs left and just whackers to come against Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins.
How they got there was a tale of play-and-misses, cross-batted swats, looping edges and that rarest of things, an Alex Carey dropped catch (though it should really have been Scott Boland’s, who capped off a futile match - no runs and no wickets - by showing only scant interest in taking a short jog forward from fly slip to catch it). Chris Woakes, the hero of the hour along with hard-hitting fire-breathing Mark Wood, looped so many leading edges and spliced shots in between fielders it was as if he was controlling the trajectory of the ball with a joystick.
It was wonderful, nerve-shredding drama, but my overriding feeling is that Australia’s attack remains too relentless and skilful for England’s high-octane, low-mileage batting unit.
For that reason Root remains pivotal and at the risk of trying to see inside his head, he seems the most vulnerable to outside noise. For all the talk of funky tactics and disrupting test cricket, the central tenet of England’s leadership axis is simple messaging that allows players to operate with clear minds - to hear the signal and ignore the noise.
That’s a lot easier in New Zealand than it is in England. Here, the Black Caps might play a lousy test or two and there might be some clown banging on about it in his newsletter, but in England, every former captain has a column, a commentary gig or a slot on talk radio. It’s relentless and even if you can block out the primary source, the secondary ones - that’s your mates texting you or sending WhatsApp links to stories or mean tweets - will get you.
If England are to level the series at Old Trafford in a fortnight, Root, who has looked caught in two minds after being criticised for his second innings dismissal at Edgbaston that let Australia back into that test, needs to get alongside Stokes again to hear the signal and forget the noise.
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As is the way with these things, it is now Australia’s tactics coming under fire.
At the moment, Australia’s short-ball attack has been all or nothing. Either there are six or seven boundary riders with a bouncer every ball or, as through the first two hours of the last day, barely a short ball bowled. When players know that nothing else is coming, as Wood did, they can sit back and get ready to play baseball.
This Cricinfo graphic made me chuckle. One of these things does not look like the other.
From the piece, in Stuff:
The self-taught guru built a world-class programme in a field event New Zealand previously did not have any pedigree in [but] within that programme, his behaviour went largely unchecked for more than a decade.
Last week, the mythology that surrounded McColl was stripped away.
The national coach was handed one of the most severe sanctions in New Zealand sporting history after an independent investigation found his conduct “over a number of years” was improper and inappropriate, amounting to serious misconduct…
The investigator found aggravating features of the conduct was that the communication with athletes included inappropriate sexual references, and that a number of the athletes were minors.
Well, for most people US$50,000 represents a decent week of work, but being tied for 33rd and 17 shots off the pace at a Pebble Beach-hoisted US Open represents another meh week at the majors for Lydia Ko.
Shane van Gisbergen went from the highs of a Nascar debut win in Chicago to the lows of being asked to slow down to let his young teammate past in Townsville. SVG had recovered from 25th on the grid - and being spun on the first lap to be a distant last - to fourth before the imposition.
In his weekly column for Business Desk ($), Trevor McKewen outlined why Nascar might be attractive to SVG.
Viewership for Nascar did dip in the 2010s but has rallied strongly since 2020 and the series smashes IndyCars on all key metrics.
It holds a unique grip on its fans as a proud American-centric series steeped in US culture.
That leads to the sport’s top stars like Kyle Busch earning an annual salary of around US$17m. The top-five earners in Nascar all pocket more than US$9m.
It would be surprising given the splash his Chicago debut made and his ability to become the face of Nascar’s street circuit push, the Giz could expect to pull a team salary [of] at least US$5m.
That’s a big leap up from his current salary in Supercars in Australia, which is reputed to be around the A$1m mark.
THIS WEEK
Been a slightly manic (and sleepless) past week or so and you’re probably sick of the sight of me in your inbox, so I’m not anticipating the next newsletter to arrive until Thursday morning.
Yeah, hmmm, not surprising your feeling it - I am - night shifts at our age - they a tough grind! I reckon that frontline reporting is young persons work - good luck with the recovery, see if we can do it all again in 10 days (nights) time!
The warriors are the real deal this year .. I been watching then since 1995 .. I’m not going to say they going to win this year ..but from where they were in the last year 3 years is amazing ..they were broken last year .. we had like the worst defensive side .. but seeing this side develop under Webster even I’m blown away .. they only going to get better ..depth in few positions might hurt us ..we still got no world class centres .. but the attack is starting to flow .. you can see what confidence can do ..
Ashes is def living up to the hype .. it’s not bazeball is the problem ..the reason why England are down in the series ..is they have dropped over 15 catches ..throw in two stumping .. and two wickets of no balls . Taking Johnny as the keeper has backfire ..he dropped now 8 catches .. miss 2 stumping .. and his batting is now hit all time low .. but you are seeing some cracks in the Australian team .. Lyon is huge a lost ..and pat fielding positions at times is been exposed ..
But bring on the 4 tests .. nothing like winding up the Aussies in cricket ..